bendy boot barny

Sat, Dec 8, 2007

Reading this month’s TGO, poor old Chris Townsend is taking a bashing from the guiding fraternity over his opinions on lightweight footwear and flexible crampons. Chris reckons it’s fine to use lightweight boots in winter, rather than the traditional heavy boot with 12 point crampons. Some people are saying this advice is both irresponsible and dangerous but they’re really taking the advice out of context I believe.

I’ve used bendy boots on vertical winter climbs, one of which was Glover’s Chimney on the Ben, a nice Grade IV romp up the side of Tower Ridge. I was young and enthusiastic and I had a borrowed hammer and a 70cm walking axe! It wasn’t particularly nice, especially when one crampon popped off after downclimbing to Garadh Gully (the chimney crux was queued up and folk had been hanging around for hours). I’ve also seen someone with KSBs and crampons going up Observatory Gully and it didn’t look too safe. So I would agree with the guides, you wouldn’t use bendy boots on the north face of the Ben. But that’s not what Chris is saying. I would guess he’s saying the advice is for hills like the Howgills or Ochils, rolling hills where you can avoid vertical stuff and wander along broad ridges all day.

My friend once got a pair of lightweight boots many years ago and he wanted to do some walking in winter, so he went back to the shop, a well known high street chain, to get a pair of crampons for them. At the time he didn’t have a lot of experience on the hills and what they did was point out the folly of combining lightweight boots with flexible crampons. He explained he wasn’t going near vertical stuff but they were adamant. He left the shop with a new pair of boots that weighed a ton, exchanged for his lightweight ones. It was a shame. He was so enthusiastic and when next I saw him his enthusiasm had taken a bashing as his feet were encased in a couple of concrete overshoes.

I’ve always thought the boot/crampon rating was a bit weird. It reminded me of the plastic menus you get in chain restaurants. They have a load of standard pictures of desserts and the menu is the same in all the ones in the chain. It’s the same for boots/crampons and there’s no room for individual choices. Well now thanks to people like Chris, there is. Put the blame/compensation culture to one side and give some real advice to people, instead of hiding behind plastic menus that do the thinking for you.